Quote from: kreut on September 13, 2017, 04:46:25 PM

Hi,

Day 2 of getting my feet wet with crypto, so sorry for the noob question...

I've opened up a Coinbase Account and am going to use Bittrex to buy/sell some alt coins. I understand that I need to buy Bitcoins first on Coinbase (GDAX), then send them over to Bittrex for the alt coin purchase. So, it sounds like the flow is:

Desposit USD in Coinbase -> Buy Bitcoin on GDAX -> Send to Bittrex -> Buy Alt Coin on Bittrex

Then, when I want to withdraw USD, I'll need to:

Sell Alt Coin for Bitcoin on Bittrex -> Send bitcoins to Coinbase (GDAX) -> Sell bitcoin for USD -> Withrdaw from Coinbase

Is this the correct flow? And if so, since I'm making 2 conversions (USD <-> Bitcoin <-> Altcoin), couldn't there be a major fluctuation before I complete my trade? For example, the Altcoin goes way up, I convert it to Bitcoin, then Bitcoin happens to go way down, then I convert it to USD, ultimately losing money?

You don't actually deposit USD into Coinbase. At least that's not the way I do it. You link your bank account to Coinbase and make a buy order for Bitcoins from your Coinbase account. Coinbase will take the funds from your bank account. This will eliminate one of the steps in the process.

The same is true when selling. Once you have Bitcoins back on Coinbase, you sell and Coinbase will move USD back to your bank account. One less step for buying and selling than you are showing.

It's been a while since I bought or sold on Coinbase but that is how I remember the process working. I don't recall that they held USD on the site.